


Fangs and Claws

by Xekstrin



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - His Dark Materials Fusion, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 14:15:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9185264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xekstrin/pseuds/Xekstrin
Summary: His Dark Materials / RWBY crossover, a short ficlet exploring how the girls got their daemons.





	

This is how they learn they are not pretty things, not soft things to be easily broken, or idly touched. Not little girls anymore.

Blake’s daemon settles when she’s ten years old.

She comes to in a darkened alleyway, Nightshade licking the blood on her forehead. The pain is sharp and brilliant, making her remember it all in an instant: the protest had turned sour, the police barged in with dogs and pepper spray and hoses, bystanders throwing rocks and garbage. One had glanced her forehead and she dragged herself to safety, curled up somewhere small and hidden.

Nightshade purrs next to her, clambering onto her lap and kissing her with a rough cat-tongue. She’s in the crevice of a building, pipes dripping, dripping. Collecting it in her hands, patiently, she waits until it overflows to bring it to her face, scrub it clean, and then start the process over again so that the two of them can drink.

At one point, deep in the night, a rat skitters close by. She’s frightened, but Nightshade is not. She grabs the rat by his neck and looks to Blake, golden eyes unfeeling as her canines crunch through its spine. They hold eye contact so Blake can feel it dying in her mouth.

Nightshade never changes again after that day.

Blake leaves her fear behind.

 

* * *

 

 

Yang is a golden summer child, her long legs and toned body and perky breasts fooling people with incautious eyes into thinking she is any older than fourteen. She’s at the park in nothing but a sports bra and tight, tight shorts. The kind her father hates seeing her in. But it’s _hot_ outside, she complains, and she isn’t going to go running in a track suit just because _he_ can’t handle how men stare at her.

Crimmy, as usual, is running his mouth and cracking wise. He dances around her, a slim greyhound eager for their daily run. Training to become a huntress is no joke. Though her father doubts her ability to stay focused on a goal for so long, she is determined to prove him wrong. To prove everyone wrong, everyone who takes one look at her and thinks they know her.

Pretty, useless, stupid little girl.

They take off like a pair of bullets, Yang aiming to beat her own record. Crimmy pants happily at her heels, howling occasionally to let other runners know to move aside as they overtake and pass them. She’s so focused on her own breathing, the trance of her body doing what god intended her to do, her heart beating in her ears, that she doesn’t realize she’s being followed until he’s right beside her.

Yang flicks her head to the side, sparing him just a single glance. Then she does a double take, looking again, but trying to pretend she isn’t. Her steps falter and Crimmy leaps up onto her shoulders. The daemon is not helping things by morphing into something long and clingy. The runner next to her is not an unfamiliar face. She’s seen him a few times at the park, shirtless and with his squirrel daemon clinging to his shoulder for dear life as he leaves other runners in the dust. He’s cute. _Very_ cute.

The strange boy keeps pace with her easily. When she speeds up, so does he, and when she slows down to let him pass her he drags his feet, maintaining his position at her side. She’s annoyed and intrigued. He’s old enough to drive, his keys jangling at his belt loops. But not much older than her. “What do you want?” she finally spits out, sweat trickling down her neck. Crimmy winds tight around her chest and neck, squirming with all the same unfamiliar emotions she’s feeling right now.

“To run with you,” the other runner says with a grin. It sparks something in her; Crimmy twists sensually around her, constricting her breathing. His muscles sinuous. His small heart beating fast. 

Still keeping pace with her, the other runner speaks again.  “Is that okay?”

“No,” she says bluntly, picking up speed again to leave him behind. But though he made a good show in pretending to care what she wanted, he follows her ever faster, always at her heels. It stops being flattering and starts being intimidating, especially as they run deeper into the park, where there are fewer pedestrians. Fewer witnesses. It escalates when she feels his hand on her shoulder, demanding she stop, demanding she talk to him, and she is so frightened and so enraged that she twists midstep, whirling in with the most inelegant roundhouse she’s ever delivered.

Her left fist hits his cheek, and her right swings up again to smash into his nose. He goes stumbling back just before she can ground herself to slam her leg into his ribs.

“Leave me _alone_!” she says, blood dripping from her clenched, trembling fists as her semblance activates. Flames roar about her, burning off her sweat and leaving her eyes red and dangerous. “What’s your problem? You got a death wish? You an idiot or something? Where do you get off chasing girls around the fucking park? Huh? Answer me!”

The other runner is sitting on the ground, one hand over his broken face, and spits venom at her. But that's all he does. She realizes that’s all the fight he has in him. This guy is no huntsman to be, no warrior in training. Just a jerk with a false sense of entitlement, and a dangerously low respect for boundaries. Crimmy launches forward to hiss and posture at the other runner’s daemon. His bright, beautiful yellow scales are warning:

_Don’t touch me, I bite._

 

* * *

 

 

Weiss and Blake have more in common than they realize; being forced to grow up too soon, being caught under the thumb of adults who don’t love them, don’t care about them, don’t want them…. but who need them. Who use them. Who exploit them. And for a very long time they confuse that need for love.

They don’t realize the truth until much, much later.

The White Fang plays a crucial role in their development as well.

Her rapier slides into his chest without resistance, like he isn’t meat and flesh but just a pad of butter, soft bread waiting to be ripped open. Crying openly, Weiss loses her grip on the sword, struck nerveless. The sword falls with him onto the floor, blood seeping onto the white fabric of his coat. A scarred beast roars at her from the emblem of his jacket, a White Fang assassin in her room in the dead of night. His daemon shrieks in terror before turning into dust and floating away.

She stands there trembling in her nightgown, not understanding, not feeling anything except the blood on her hands.

 _Are_ those her hands?

Is that Stern, her own daemon, standing over her, his ferocious eyes full of concern?

She doesn’t recognize him, doesn’t recognize his shape even as she hears his voice. “Weiss?” Weiss? Are you okay? Talk to me!”

She crumples to the floor, not wanting this, not able to process the stalking bird of prey who frets over her. He is unable to hold her like he used to, a giant panda bear or a dog to cuddle up onto her lap. Just this vicious beast, this killer with a blood red mask smeared across his eyes.

The physical representation of her, who she is.

The mirror reflects back, and what she sees terrifies her.

 

* * *

 

 

Ruby steps off the plane on her first day at Beacon, her daemon cuddled up into her arms. Jasper betrays her nerves as he makes himself as small as possible. Who he is is not certain yet, not as he shifts again to twine around her neck or run at her heels, tongue lolling out of his mouth. Who she is is not certain yet, so many threads of fate locked around her neck, pulling her this way and that, each with their own glorious, sinister purpose.

He licks her cheek. “Nervous?”

“Not in a million years,” she says. And pauses. “Okay, maybe a little nervous.”

Jasper laughs, and she laughs, and she’s so distracted by all the new sights and sounds that she barely even feels it when her ankle catches over something and she falls into a heap of luggage and spilled Dust vials.

“What are you _doing_?” a shrill voice demands, the sound of a bird daemon shrieking and squawking in rage.

And that’s how it starts.

**Author's Note:**

> Weiss's daemon is Stern. He's a secretary bird.
> 
> Blake's daemon is Nightshade. She's a serval. Faunus are more likely to have same-gender daemons.
> 
> Yang's daemon is Crimson or Crimmy for short, and he's a red-spotted pit viper.
> 
> Ruby's daemon is unsettled, and his name is Jasper.
> 
> Jaune gets a weasel (Dandelion), Nora gets a badger (Vidhbiorn), Ren gets a kingfisher (Xiaopei) and Pyrrha gets a lion (Sparta).


End file.
